Ukrainian forces have regained control of Bucha. An elderly woman cries as she walks through her city, destroyed by Russian military forces.
The last time I was in Kyiv, my grandmother brought me to her favorite crypt. It was one of those churches with lots of domes on its head, spindle knobs like golden garlic cloves. We crept, hushed, into the winding underground alleys below the church. We held red wax candles and they flashed against golden altars in dark corners where mummified monks had laid for centuries. The coffins had windows; decay fogged up the glass.
My grandmother had a scarf wrapped around her head and a permanent scowl etched by years of dogged survival: rations, factory work, running shoeless in the snow. She knelt at each coffin. “This is the monk you pray to for childbirth,” our guide advised me. When we emerged into the busy light of Kyiv, I was hungry, and my babushka sensed it. We left the underground world behind and walked into the sunshine of our city.
Kyiv’s underground now shelters far more than just monks. Fifteen-thousand residents shelter in train stations in Kyiv: playing cards, drinking tea, petting dogs, texting, sleeping, weeping, laughing, swearing, staring off into space. Kyiv’s Arslenka station, informally known as the deepest metro station in the world, was built during the Cold War as a bomb shelter, back when Russia and Ukraine were socialist republics in a shared federal union. Today, children’s movies play and maternity ward babies wiggle in that same station as cluster munitions incinerate apartment complexes overhead.
Yana Plotnitska is a blogger with a background in social media, communications, and photography. Her son, Ostap, is almost 2 years old. They’re on the front lines of the war in Ukraine. We spoke about their daily life, attempts to find shelter, and hopes for the future. This interview was conducted in Ukrainian via Telegram on March 10. It was translated by the author and lightly edited for clarity.
YANA PLOTNITSKA: The 15th day of the war in Ukraine is coming to an end. I still can't believe it. It's like a nightmare: There is a war in my country.
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